"Well, my dear," said Betty, laughing, and slipping her arm through Marcella's as they stood in the opening of the window, "I see you have been doing your duty for once. Let me pat you on the back. All the more that I gather you are not exactly enchanted with Lady Tressady. You really should keep your face in order. From the other end of the room I know exactly what you think of the person you are talking to."

"Do you?" said Marcella, penitently. "I wish you didn't."

"Well you may wish it, for it doesn't help the political lady to get what she wants. However, I don't think that Lady Tressady has found out yet that you don't like her. She isn't thin-skinned. If you had looked like that when you were talking to me, I would have paid you out somehow. What is the matter with her?"

"Oh! I don't know," said Marcella, impatiently, raising her shoulders. "But she jarred. I pined to get away—I don't think I ever want to talk to her again."

"No," said Betty, ruminating; "I'll tell you what it is—she isn't a gentleman! Don't interrupt me! I mean exactly what I say—she isn't a gentleman. She would do and say all the things that a nice man squirms at. I always have the oddest fancy about that kind of person. I see them as they must be at night—all the fine clothes gone—just a little black soul scrawled between the bedclothes!"

"You to call me censorious!" said Marcella, laughing, and pinching her friend's arm.

"My dear, as I have often before remarked to you, I am not a great lady, with a political campaign to tight. If you knew your business, you would make friends with the mammon of unrighteousness in the shape of Lady Tressadys. I may do what I please—I have only a husband to manage!" and Betty's light voice dropped into a sigh.

"Poor Betty!" said Marcella, patting her hand. "Is Frank as discontented as ever?"

"He told me yesterday he hated his existence, and thought he would try whether the Serpentine would drown him. I said I was agreeable, only he would never achieve it without me. I should have to 'tice away the police while he looked for the right spot. So he has promised to take me into partnership, and it's all right so far."

Then Betty fell to sighing in earnest.

"It's all very well 'chaffing,' but I am a miserable woman. Frank says I have ruined his life; that it's all my ambition; that he might have made a decent country gentleman if I hadn't sown the seed of every vice in him by driving him into politics. Pleasant, isn't it, for a model wife like me?"

"You'll have to let him give it up," said Marcella, smiling; "I don't believe he'll ever reconcile himself to the grind and the town life."

Betty clenched her small hands.

"My dear! I never promised to marry a sporting boor, and I can't yet make up my mind to sink to it. Don't let's talk of it! I only hope he'll vote straight in the next few months. But the thought of being kept through August drives him desperate already. Ah! here they are—plagues of the human race!—" and she waved an accusing hand towards the incoming stream of gentlemen. "Now, I'll prophesy, and you watch. Lady Tressady will make two friends here—Harding Watton—oh! I forgot, he's her cousin!—and Lord Cathedine. Mark my words. By the way—" Betty caught Marcella's arm and spoke eagerly into her friend's ear. Her eyes meanwhile glanced over her shoulder towards Lady Madeleine and her mother, who were seated on the further side of the room.

Marcella's look followed Betty's, but she showed no readiness to answer Betty's questions. When Letty had made her astonishing remarks on the subject of Madeleine Penley, Lady Maxwell had tried to stop her with a hauteur which would have abashed most women, though it had but small effect on the bride. And now, even to Betty, who was Madeleine Penley's friend, Marcella was not communicative; although when Betty was carried off by Lord Naseby who came in search of her as soon as he entered the drawing-room, the elder woman stood for a moment by the window, watching the girl they had been talking of with a soft serious look.

But the softness passed. A slight incident disturbed it. For the spectator saw Lady Kent, who was sitting beside her daughter, raise a gigantic fan and beckon to Lord Ancoats. He came unwillingly, and she made some bantering remark. Lady Madeleine meanwhile was bending over a book of photographs, with a flushed cheek and a look of constraint. Ancoats stood near her for a moment uneasily, frowning and pulling at his moustache. Then with an abrupt word to Lady Kent, he turned away and threw himself on a sofa beside Lord Cathedine. Lady Madeleine bent lower over her book, her beautiful hair making a spot of fire in the room. Marcella caught the expression of her profile, and her own face took a look of pain. She would have liked to go instantly to the girl's side, with some tenderness, some caress. But that gorgon Lady Kent, now looking extremely fierce, was in the way, and moreover other young men had arrived to take the place Ancoats had apparently refused.

Meanwhile Letty saw the arrival of the gentlemen with delight. She had found but small entertainment in the lady to whom Mrs. Allison had introduced her. Miss Paston, the sister of Lord Ancoats's agent, was a pleasant-looking spinster of thirty-five in a Quakerish dress of grey silk. Her face bore witness that she was capable and refined. But Letty felt no desire whatever to explore capability and refinement. She had not come to Castle Luton to make herself agreeable to Miss Paston.

So the conversation languished. Letty yawned a little, and flourished her fan a great deal, till the appearance of the men brought back the flush to her cheek and animation to her eye. She drew herself up at once, hungry for notice and success. Mrs. Hawkins, the vicar's wife at Malford, would have been avenged could she have watched her old tyrant under these chastening circumstances.

Harding Watton crossed the room when he saw his cousin, and took the corner of the sofa beside her. Letty received him graciously, though she was perhaps disappointed that it was not Lord Ancoats or Lord Cathedine. Looking round before she gave herself to conversation with him, she saw that George was standing near the open window with Lord Maxwell and Sir Philip Wentworth, the ex-Governor. They were talking of India, and Sir Philip had his hand on George's arm.

"Yes, I saw Dalliousie go," he said eagerly. "I was only a lad of twenty, but I can't think of it now without a lump in my throat. When he limped on to the Hooghly landing-stage on his crutches we couldn't cheer him—I shall never forget that sudden silence! In eight years he had made a new India, and there we saw him,—our little hero,—dying of his work at forty-six before our eyes! ... Well, I couldn't have imagined that a young man like you would have known or cared so much about that time. What a talk we have had! Thank you!"

And the veteran tightened his grip cordially for a moment on Tressady's arm, then dropped it and walked away.

Tressady threw his wife a bright glance, as though to ask her how she fared. Letty smiled graciously in reply, feeling a sudden softening pleasure in being so thought of. As her eyes met her husband's she saw Marcella Maxwell, who was still standing by the window, turn towards George and call to him. George moved forward with alacrity. Then he and Lady Maxwell slowly walked down the steps to the garden, and disappeared through one of the archways to the left.

"That great lady and George seem at last to have made friends," said Harding Watton to Letty, in a laughing undertone. "I have no doubt she is trying to win him over. Well she may! Before the next few weeks are over the Government will be in a fix with this Bill; and not even their 'beautiful lady' will help them out. Maxwell looks as glum as an owl to-night."

Letty laughed. The situation pleased her vanity a good deal. The thought of Lady Maxwell humiliated and defeated—partly by George's means—was decidedly agreeable to her. Which would seem to show that she was, after all, more sensitive or more quick-eyed than Betty Leven had been ready to allow.

* * * * *

Meanwhile Marcella and George Tressady were strolling slowly towards the river, along a path that crossed the great lawns. In front of them the stretches of grass, bathed in silvery light and air, ran into far distances of shade under majestic trees just thickening to a June wealth of foliage. Below, these distant tree-masses made sharp capes and promontories on the white grass; above, their rounded tops rose dark against a blue, light-breathing sky. At one point the river pierced the blackness of the wood, and in the space thus made the spire of a noble church shot heavenward. Swans floated dimly along the stream and under the bridge. The air was fresh, but the rawness of spring was gone. It was the last week of May; the "high midsummer pomps" were near—a heavenly prophecy in wood and field.

And not even Tressady's prejudice—which, indeed, was already vanishing—could fail to see in the beautiful woman beside him the fitting voice and spirit of such a scene.

To-night he said to himself that one must needs believe her simple, in spite of report. During their companionship this evening she had shown him more and more plainly that she liked his society; her manner towards him, indeed, had by now a soft surrender and friendliness that no man could possibly have met with roughness, least of all a man young and ambitious. But at the same time he noticed again, as he had once noticed with anger, that she was curiously free from the usual feminine arts and wiles. After their long talk at dinner, indeed, he began, in spite of himself, to feel her not merely an intellectual comrade,—that he had been conscious of from the first,—but rather a most winning and attaching companion. It was a sentiment of friendly ease, that seemed to bring with it a great relief from tension. The sordid cares and frictions of the last few weeks, and the degrading memories of the day itself, alike ceased to wear him.

Yet all the time he said to himself, with inward amusement, that he must take care! They had not talked directly of the Bill at dinner, but they had talked round and about it incessantly. It was clear that the Maxwells were personally very anxious; and George knew well that the public position of the Ministry was daily becoming more difficult. There had been a marked cooling on the subject of the Bill among their own supporters; one or two London members originally pledged to it were even believed to be wavering; and this campaign lately started by Fontenoy and Watton against two of the leading clauses of the measure, in a London "daily," bought for the purpose, had been so far extremely damaging. The situation was threatening indeed, and Maxwell might well look harassed.

Yet Tressady had detected no bitterness in Lady Maxwell's mood. Her temper rather seemed to him very strenuous, very eager, and a little sad. Altogether, he had been touched, he knew not exactly why, by his conversation with her. "We are going to win," he said to himself, "and she knows it." Yet to think thus gave him, for the first time, no particular pleasure.

As they strolled along they talked a little of some of the topics that had been started at dinner, topics semi-political and semi-social, till suddenly Lady Maxwell said, with a change of voice:

"I heard some of your conversation with Sir Philip just now. How differently you talk when you talk of India!"

"I wonder what that means," said George, smiling. "It means, at any rate, that when I am not talking of India, but of English labour, or the poor, you think I talk like a brute."

"I shouldn't put it like that," she said quietly. "But when you talk of India, and people like the Lawrences or Lord Dalhousie, then it is that one sees what you really admire—what stirs you—what makes you feel."

"Well, ought I not to feel? Is there to be no gratitude towards the people that have made one's country?"

He looked down, upon her gaily, perfectly conscious of his own tickled vanity. To be observed and analysed by such a critic was in itself flattery.

"That have made one's country?" she repeated, not without a touch of irony. Then suddenly she became silent.

George thrust his hands into his pockets and waited a little.

"Well?" he said presently. "Well? I am waiting to hear you prove that the Dalhousies and the Lawrences have done nothing for the country, compared to—what shall we say?—some trade-union secretary whom you particularly admire."

She laughed, but he did not immediately draw his answer. They had reached the river-bank and the steps of the little bridge. Marcella mounted the bridge and paused midway across it, hanging over the parapet. He followed her, and both stood gazing at the house. It rose from the grass like some fabric of yellowish ivory cut and scrolled and fretted by its Tudor architect, who had been also a goldsmith. There were lights like jewels in its latticed windows; the dark fulness of the trees, disposed by an artist-hand, enwrapped or fell away from it as the eye required; and on the dazzling lawns, crossed by soft bands of shadow, scattered forms moved up and down—women in trailing dresses, and black-coated men. There were occasional sallies of talk and laughter, and from the open window of the drawing-room came the notes of a violin.

"Brahms!" said Marcella, with delight. "Nothing but music and he could express this night—or the river—or the rising glow and bloom of everything."

As she spoke George felt a quick gust of pleasure and romance sweep across him. It was as though senses that had been for long on the defensive, tired, or teased merely by the world, gave way in a moment to joy and poetry. He looked from the face beside him to the pictured scene in which they stood—the soft air filled his lungs—what ailed him?—he only knew that after many weeks he was, somehow, happy and buoyant again!

Lady Maxwell, however, soon forgot the music and the moonlight.

"That have made one's country?" she repeated, pausing on the words. "And of course that house appeals to you in the same way? Famous people have lived in it—people who belong to history. But for me, the real making of one's country is done out of sight, in garrets and workshops and coalpits, by people who die every minute—forgotten—swept into heaps like autumn leaves, their lives mere soil and foothold for the generation that comes after them. All yesterday morning, for instance, I spent trying to feed a woman I know. She is a shirtmaker; she has four children, and her husband is a docker out of work. She had sewed herself sick and blind. She couldn't eat, and she couldn't sleep. But she had kept the children alive—and the man. Her life will flicker out in a month or two; but the children's lives will have taken root, and the man will be eating and earning again. What use would your Dalhousies and Lawrences be to England without her and the hundreds of thousands like her?"

"And yet it is you," cried George, unable to forbear the chance she gave him, "who would take away from this very woman the power of feeding her children and saving her husband—who would spoil all the lives in the clumsy attempt to mend one of them. How can you quote me such an instance! It amazes me."

"Not at all. I have only to use my instance for another purpose, in another way. You are thinking of the Bill, of course? But all we do is to say to some of these victims, 'Your sacrifice, as it stands, is too costly; the State in its own interest cannot go on exacting or allowing it. We will help you to serve the community in ways that shall exhaust and wound it less.'"

"And as a first step, drive you all comfortably into the workhouse!" said George. "Don't omit that."

"Many individuals must suffer," she said steadily. "But there will be friends to help—friends that will strain every nerve to help."

All her heart showed itself in voice and emphasis. Almost for the first time in their evening's talk her natural passionateness came to sight—the Southern, impulsive temper, that so often made people laugh at or dislike her. Under the lace shawl she had thrown round her on coming out he saw the quick rise and fall of the breast, the nervous clasp of the hands lying on the stonework of the bridge. These were her prophetess airs again. To-night they still amused him, but in a gentler and more friendly way.

"And so, according to your own account, you will protect your tailoress and unmake your country. I am sorry for your dilemma," he said, laughing.

"Ah! well,"—she shrugged her shoulders with a sigh,—"don't let's talk of it. It's all too pressing—and sore—and hot. And to think of the weeks that are just coming on!"

George, hanging over the parapet beside her, felt reply a little awkward, and said nothing. For a minute or two the night made itself heard, the gentle slipping of the river, the fitful breathings from the trees. A swan passed and repassed below them, and an owl called from the distant woods.

Presently Marcella lifted a white finger and pointed to the house.

"One wouldn't want a better parable," she said. "It's like the State as you see it—magnificent, inspiring, a thing of pomp and dignity. But we women, who have to drive and keep going a house like that—we know what it all rests upon. It rests upon a few tired kitchen-maids and boot-boys and scullery-girls, hurrying, panting creatures, whom a guest never sees, who really run it all. I know, for I have tried to unearth them, to organise them, to make sure that no one was fainting while we were feasting. But it is incredibly hard; half the human race believes itself born to make things easy for the other half. It comes natural to them to ache and toil while we sit in easy chairs. What they resent is that we should try to change it."

"Goodness!" said George, pulling at his moustaches. "I don't recognise my own experience of the ordinary domestic polity in that summary."

"I daresay. You have to do with the upper servant, who is always a greater tyrant than his master," she retorted, her voice expressing a curious medley of laughter and feeling. "I am speaking of the people that are not seen, like the tailoress and shirtmaker, in your drum-and-trumpet State."

"Well, you may be right," said George, drily. "But I confess—if I may be quite frank—that I don't altogether trust you to judge. I want at least, before I strike the balance between my Dalhousie and your tailoress, to hear what those people have to say who have not crippled their minds—by pity!"

"Pity!" she said, her lip trembling in spite of herself. "Pity!—you count pity a disease?"

"As you—and others—practise it," he replied coolly, turning round upon her. "It is no good; the world can't be run by pity. At least, living always seems to me a great brutal, rushing, rough-and-tumble business, which has to be carried on whether we like it or no. To be too careful, too gingerly over the separate life, brings it all to a standstill. Meddle too much, and the Demiurge who set the machine going turns sulky and stops working. Then the nation goes to pieces—till some strong ruffian without a scruple puts it together again."

"What do you mean by the Demiurge?"

He laughed.

"Why do you make me explain my flights? Well, I suppose, the natural daimonic power in things, which keeps them going and set them off; which is not us, or like us, and cares nothing for us."

His light voice developed a sudden energy during his little speech.

"Ah!" said Marcella, wistfully. "Yes, if one thought that, I could understand. But, even so, if the power behind things cares nothing for us, I should only regard it as challenging us to care more for each other. Do you mind my asking you a few plain questions? Do you know anything personally of the London poor? I mean, have you any real friends among them, whose lives you know?"

"Well, I sit with Fontenoy while he receives deputations from all those tailoresses and shirtmakers and fur-sewers that you want to put in order. The harassed widow streams through his room perpetually—wailing to be let alone!"

Marcella made a sound of amused scorn.

"Oh! you think that nothing," said George, indignant. "I vow I could draw every type of widow that London contains—I know them intimately."

She shook her head.

"I give up London. Then, in the North, aren't you a coal-owner? Do you know your miners?"

"Yes, and I detest them!" said George, shortly; "pig-headed brutes! They will be on strike next month, and I shall be defrauded of my lawful income till their lordships choose to go back. Pity me, if you please—not them!"

"So I do," she said with spirit—"if you hate the men by whom you live!"

There was silence. Then suddenly George said, in another tone:

"But sometimes, I don't deny, the beggars wring it out of one—your pity. I saw a mother last week—Suppose we stroll on a little. I want to see how the river gets out of the wood."

They descended the bridge, and turned again into the river-path. George told the story of Mary Batchelor in his half-ironic way, yet so that here and there Marcella shivered. Then gradually, as though it were a relief to him to talk, he slipped into a half-humorous, half-serious discussion of his mine-owner's position and its difficulties. Incidentally and unconsciously a good deal of his history betrayed itself in his talk: his bringing-up, his mother; the various problems started in his mind since his return from India; even his relations to his wife. Once or twice it flashed across him that he was confessing himself with an extraordinary frankness to a woman he had made up his mind to dislike. But the reflection did not stop him. The balmy night, the solitude, this loveliness that walked beside him so willingly and kindly—with every step they struck his defences from him; they drew; they penetrated.

With her, too, everything was simple and natural. She had felt his attraction at their first meeting; she had determined to make a friend of him; and she was succeeding. As he disclosed himself she felt a strange compassion for him. It was plain to her woman's instinct that he was at heart lonely and uncompanioned. Well, what wonder with that hard, mean little being for a wife! Had she captured him, or had he thrown himself away upon her in mere wantonness, out of that defiance of sentiment which appeared to be his favourite parti-pris? In any case, it seemed to this happy wife that he had done the one fatal and irreparable thing; and she was genuinely sorry for him. She felt him very young, too. As far as she could gather, he was about two years her junior; but her feeling made the gap much greater.

Yet, of course, the situation,—Maxwell, Fontenoy,—all that those names implied to him and her, made a thrilling under-note in both their minds. She never forgot her husband and his straits; and in George's mind Fontenoy's rugged figure stood sentinel. Given the circumstances, both her temperament and her affections drove her inevitably into trying, first to attract, then to move and influence her companion. And given the circumstances, he could but yield himself bit by bit to her woman's charm; while full all the time of a confident scorn for her politics.

Insensibly, the stress upon them drew them back to London and to current affairs, and at last she said to him, with vehemence:

"You must see these people in the flesh—and not in your house, but in theirs. Or, first come and meet them in mine?"

"Why, please, should you think St. James's Square a palace of truth compared to Carlton House Terrace?" he asked her, with amusement. Fontenoy lived in Carlton House Terrace.

"I am not inviting you to St. James's Square," she said quietly. "That house is only my home for one set of purposes. Just now my true home is not there at all. It is in the Mile End Road."

George asked to be informed, and opened his eyes at her account of the way in which she still divided her time between the West End and the East, spending always one or two nights a week among the trades and the work-people she had come to know so intimately, whose cause she was fighting with such persistence.

"Maxwell doesn't come now," she said. "He is too busy, and his work there is done. But I go because I love the people, and to talk with them and live with them part of every week keeps one's mind clear as to what one wants, and why. Well,"—her voice showed that she smiled,—"will you come? My old maid shall give you coffee, and you shall meet a roomful of tailors and shirtmakers. You shall see what people look like in the flesh—not on paper—after working fourteen hours at a stretch, in a room where you and I could not breathe!"

"Charming!"—he bowed ironically. "Of course I will come."

They had paused under the shadow of a grove of beech-trees, and were looking back towards the moonlit garden and the house. Suddenly George said, in an odd voice:

"Do you mind my saying it? You know, nobody is ever converted—politically—nowadays."

In the darkness her flush could not be seen. But he felt the mingled pride and soreness in her voice, under its forced brightness.

"I know. How long is it since a speech turned a vote in the House of Commons! One wonders why people take the trouble to speak. Shall we go back? Ah! there is someone pursuing us—my husband and Ancoats!"

And two figures, dark for an instant against the brightness of the lawns, plunged into the shadow of the wood.

"You wanderers!" said Maxwell, as he distinguished his wife's white dress. "Is this path quite safe in this darkness? Suppose we get out of it."

The river, indeed, beneath a steep bank, ran close beside them, and the trees meeting overhead all but shut out the moon. Maxwell, in some anxiety, caught his wife's arm, and made her pause till his eye should be once more certain of the path. Meanwhile Ancoats and Tressady walked quickly back to the lawn, Ancoats talking and laughing with unusual vigour.

* * * * *

The Maxwells did not hurry themselves. As they emerged from the wood Marcella slipped her hand into her husband's. It was her characteristic caress. The slim, strong hand loved to feel itself in the shelter of his; while to him that seeking touch was the symbol of all that she brought him—the inventive, inexhaustible arts of a passion which was a kind of genius.

"Don't go in!" she pleaded. "Why should we?"

"No!—why should we?" he repeated, sighing. "Why are we here at all?—that is what I have been asking myself all the evening. And now more than ever since my walk with that boy Ancoats."

"Tell me about it," she said eagerly. "Could you get nothing out of him?"

Maxwell shrugged his shoulders.

"Nothing. He vows that everything is all right; that he knows a pack of slanderers have been 'yelping at him,' and he wishes both they and his mother would let him alone."

"His mother!" cried Marcella, outraged.

"Well, I suppose I said to him the kind of thing you would evidently like to say. But with no result. He merely laughed, and chattered about everything under the sun—his race-horses, new plays, politics—Heaven knows what! He is in an excited state—feverish, restless, and, I should think, unhappy. But he would tell nothing—to me."

"How much do you think she knows?"

"His mother? Nothing, I should say. Every now and then I detect a note of extra anxiety when she talks to him; and there is evidently something in her mind, some impression from his manner, perhaps, which is driving her more keenly than ever towards this marriage. But I don't believe a single one of the stories that have reached us has reached her. And now—here is this poor girl—and even my dull eyes have noticed that to-night he has purposely, markedly, avoided her."

Marcella felt her cheek flame.

"And when one thinks of his behaviour in the winter!" she cried.

They wandered on along a path that skirted the wood, talking anxiously about the matter which had in truth brought them to Castle Luton. In spite of the comparative gentleness of English political relations, neither Maxwell nor Marcella, perhaps, would willingly have become Charlotte Allison's guests at a moment when her house was actually the headquarters of a violent and effective opposition to Maxwell's policy, when moreover the leader of that opposition was likely to be of the party. But about a fortnight before Whitsuntide some tales of young Ancoats had suddenly reached Maxwell's ears, with such effect that on his next meeting with Ancoats's mother he practically invited himself and Marcella—greatly to Mrs. Allison's surprise—to Castle Luton for Whitsuntide.

For the boy had been Maxwell's ward, and Henry Allison had been the intimate friend and comrade of Maxwell's father. And Maxwell's feeling for his father, and for his father's friends, was of such a kind that his guardian's duties had gone deep with him. He had done his best for the boy, and since Ancoats had reached his majority his ex-guardian had still kept him anxiously in mind.

Of late indeed Ancoats had troubled himself very little about his guardian, or his guardian's anxieties. He seemed to have been devoting a large share of his mind to the avoidance of his mother's old friends; and the Maxwells, for months, in spite of many efforts on their part, had seen little or nothing of him. Maxwell for various reasons had begun to suspect a number of uncomfortable things with regard to the young fellow's friends and pleasures. Yet nothing could be taken hold of till this sudden emergence of a particular group of stories, coupling Ancoats's name with that of a notorious little actress whose adventures had already provided a certain class of newspaper with abundant copy.

Then Maxwell, who cared personally very little for the red-haired youth himself, took alarm for the mother's sake. For in the case of Mrs. Allison a scandal of the kind suggested meant a tragedy. Her passion for her son was almost a tragedy already, so closely mingled in it were the feelings of the mother and those of the Christian, to whom "vice" is not an amusement, but an agony.

* * * * *

Yet, as Marcella said and felt, it was a hard fate that had forced Maxwell to concern himself with Ancoats's love-affairs at this particular moment.

"Don't think of it," she said at last, urgently, as they walked along. "It is too bad; as if there were not enough!"

Maxwell stood still, with a little smile, and put his arm round her shoulders.

"Dear, I shall soon have time enough, probably, to think about Ancoats's affairs or anything else. Do you know that I was planning this morning what we would do when we go out? Shall we slip over to the Australian colonies in the autumn? I would give a good deal to see them for myself."

She gave a low cry of pain.

"Why are you so depressed to-night? Is there any fresh news?"

"Yes. And, altogether, things look increasingly bad for us, and increasingly well for them. It will be extraordinarily close anyway—probably a matter of a vote or two." And he gave her a summary of his after-dinner conversation with Lord Cathedine, a keen ally of Fontenoy's in the Lords, and none the less a shrewd fellow because he happened to be also a detestable person.

Marcella heard the news of one or two fresh defections from the Government with amazement and indignation. She stood there in the darkness, leaning against the man she loved, her heart beating fast and stormily. How could the world thus misconceive and thwart him? And what could she do? Her mind ran passionately through a hundred schemes, refusing to submit—to see him baffled and defeated.



CHAPTER XII

To Lord Ancoats himself this party of his mother's was an oppression and a nuisance. He had only been induced to preside over it with difficulty; and his mother had been both hurt and puzzled by his reluctance to play the host.

If you had asked Maxwell's opinion on the point, he would have told you that Ancoats's bringing up had a good deal to do with the present anxieties of Ancoats's mother. He—Maxwell—had done his best, but he had been overmatched.

First and foremost, Ancoats had been to no public school. It was not the custom of the family; and Mrs. Allison could not be induced to break the tradition. There was accordingly a succession of tutors, whose Church-principles at least were sound. And Ancoats showed himself for a time an impressionable, mystical boy, entirely in sympathy with his mother. His confirmation was a great family emotion, and when he was seventeen Mrs. Allison had difficulty in making him take food enough in Lent to keep him in health. Maxwell was beginning to wonder where it would end, when the lad was sent to Cambridge, and the transformation scene that might always perhaps have been expected, began.

He had been two years at Trinity when he went to pay the Maxwells a visit at the Court. Maxwell could hardly believe his eyes or ears. The boy who at nineteen was an authority on church music and ancient "uses," by twenty-one talked and thought of nothing in heaven or earth but the stage and French bric-a-brac. His conversation swarmed with the names of actors, singers, and dancers; but they were names that meant nothing except to the initiated. They were the small people of the small theatres; and Ancoats was a Triton among them, not at all, so he carefully informed his kindred, because of his wealth and title, but because he too was an artist, and could sing, revel, write, and dance with the best of them.

For some time Maxwell was able to console Mrs. Allison with the historical reflection that more than one son of the Oxford Movement had found in a passion for the stage a ready means of annoying the English Puritan. When it came, however, to the young man's producing risky plays of his own composing at extremely costly matinees, there was nothing for it but to interfere. Maxwell at last persuaded him to give up the farce of Cambridge and go abroad. But Ancoats would only go with a man of his own sort; and their time was mostly spent in Paris, where Ancoats divided his hard-spent existence between the furious pursuit of Louis Quinze bibelots and the patronage of two or three minor theatres. To be the king of a first night, raining applause and bouquets from his stage-box, seemed to give him infinite content; but his vanity was hardly less flattered by the compliments say of M. Tournonville, the well-known dealer on the Quai Voltaire, who would bow himself before the young Englishman with the admiring cry, "Mon Dieu! milord, que vous etes fin connoisseur!" while the dealer's assistant grinned among the shadows of the back-shop.

At last, at twenty-four, he must needs return to England for his coming of age under his grandfather's will and the taking over of his estate. Under the sobering influence of these events, his class and his mother seemed for a time to recover him. He refurnished a certain number of rooms at Castle Luton, and made a special marvel of his own room, which was hung thick with Boucher, Greuze, and Watteau engravings, littered with miniatures and trinkets, and encumbered here and there with portfolios of drawings which he was not anxious to unlock in his mother's presence.

Moreover, he was again affectionate to his mother, and occasionally even went to church with her. The instincts of the English aristocrat reappeared amid the accomplishments of the petit-maitre, and poor Mrs. Allison's spirits revived. Then the golden-haired Lady Madeleine was asked to stay at Castle Luton. When she came Ancoats devoted himself with extraordinary docility. He drew her, made songs for her, and devised French charades to act with her; he even went so far as to compare her with enthusiasm to the latest and most wonderful "Salome" just exhibited in the Salon by the latest and most wonderful of the impressionists. But Lady Madeleine fortunately had not seen the picture.

Then suddenly, one morning, Ancoats went up to town without notice and remained there. After a while his mother pursued him thither; but Ancoats was restless at sight of her, and she was not long in London, though long enough to show the Maxwells and others that her heart was anxiously set upon Lady Madeleine as a daughter-in-law.

This then—taken together with the stories now besprinkling the newspapers—was the situation. Naturally, Ancoats's affairs, as he himself was irritably aware, were now, in one way or another, occupying the secret thoughts or the private conversations of most of his mother's guests.

For instance—

* * * * *

"Are you nice?" said Betty Leven, suddenly, to young Lord Naseby, in the middle of Sunday morning. "Are you in a charitable, charming, humble, and trusting frame of mind? Because, if not, I shall go away—I have had too much of Lady Kent!"

Charlie Naseby laughed. He was sitting reading in the shade at the edge of one of the Castle Luton lawns. For some time past he had been watching Betty Leven and Lady Kent, as they talked under a cedar-tree some little distance from him. Lady Kent conversed with her whole bellicose person—her cap, her chin, her nose, her spreading and impressive shoulders. And from her gestures young Naseby guessed that she had been talking to Betty Leven rather more in character than usual.

He felt a certain curiosity about the tete-a-tete. So that when Betty left her companion and came tripping over the lawn to the house, the young man lifted his face and gave her a smiling nod, as though to invite her to come and visit him on the way. Betty came, and then as she stood in front of him delivered the home question already reported.

"Am I nice?" repeated young Naseby. "Far from it. I have not been to church, and I have been reading a French novel of which I do not even propose to tell you the name."

And he promptly slipped his volume into his pocket.

"Which is worst?" said Betty, pensively: "to break the fourth Commandment or the ninth? Lady Kent, of course, has been trampling on them both. But the ninth is her particular victim. She calls it 'getting to the roots of things.'"

"Whose roots has she been delving at this morning?" said Naseby.

Betty looked behind her, saw that Lady Kent had gone into the house, and let herself drop into the corner of Naseby's bench with a sigh of fatigue.

"One feels as though one were a sort of house-dog tussling with a burglar. I have been keeping her off all my friends' secrets by main force; so she had to fall back on George Tressady, and tell me ugly tales of his mamma."

"George Tressady! Why on earth should she do him an ill turn? I don't believe she ever saw him before."

Betty pressed her lips. She and Charlie Naseby had been friends since they wore round pinafores and sat on high nursery chairs side by side.

"One needn't go to the roots of things," she said, severely, "but one should have eyes in one's head. Has it ever occurred to you that Ancoats has taken a special fancy to Sir George—that he sat talking to him last night till all hours, and that he has been walking about with him the whole of this morning, instead of walking about—well! with somebody else—as he was meant to do? Why do men behave in this ridiculous manner? Women, of course. But men! It's like a trout that won't let itself be landed. And what's the good? It's only prolonging the agony."

"Not at all," said Naseby, laughing. "There's always the chance of slipping the hook." Then his lively face became suddenly serious. "But it's time, I think," he added, almost with vehemence, "that Lady Kent stopped trying to land Ancoats. In the first place, it's no good. He won't be landed against his will. In the next—well, I only know," he broke off, "that if I had a sister in love with Ancoats at the present moment, I'd carry her off to the North Pole rather than let her be talked about with him!"

Betty opened her eyes.

"Then there is something in the stories!" she cried. "Of course, Frank told me there was nothing. And the Maxwells have not said a word. And now I understand why Lady Kent has been dinning it into my ears—I could only be thankful Mrs. Allison was safe at church—that Ancoats should marry early. 'Oh! my dear, it's always been the only hope for them!'" Betty mimicked Lady Kent's deep voice and important manner: "'Why, there was the grandfather—his wife had a time!—I could tell you things about him!—oh! and her too.—And even Henry Allison!—' There, of course, I stopped her."

"Old ghoul!" said Naseby, in disgust. "So she knows. And yet—good Heavens! where does that charming girl come from?"

He knocked the end off his cigarette, and returned it to his mouth with a rather unsteady hand.

"Knows?—knows what?" said Betty. There was a pink flush, perhaps of alarm, on her pretty cheek, but her eyes said plainly that if there were risks she must run them.

Naseby hesitated. The natural reticence of one young man about another held him back—and he was Ancoats's friend. But he liked Lady Madeleine, and her mother's ugly manoeuvres in the sight of gods and men filled him with a restless ill-temper.

"You say the Maxwells have told you nothing?" he said at last. "But all the same I am pretty certain that Maxwell is here for nothing else. What on earth should he be doing in this galere just now! Look at him and Fontenoy! They've been pacing that lime-walk for a good hour. No one ever saw such a spectacle before. Of course something's up!"

Betty followed his eyes, and caught the figures of the two men between the trunks as they moved through the light and shadow of the lime-walk—Fontenoy's massive head sunk in his shoulders, his hands clasped behind his back; Maxwell's taller and alerter form beside him. Fontenoy had, in fact, arrived that morning from town, just too late to accompany Mrs. Allison and her flock to church; and Maxwell and he had been together since the moment when Ancoats, having brought his guest into the garden, had gone off himself on a walk with Tressady.

"Ancoats and Tressady came back past here," Naseby went on. "Ancoats stood still, with his hands on his sides, and looked at those two. His expression was not amiable. 'Something hatching,' he said to Tressady. I suppose Ancoats got his sneer from his actor-friends—none of us could do it without practice. 'Shall we go and pull the chief out of that?' But they didn't go. Ancoats turned sulky, and went into the house by himself."

"I'm glad I don't have to keep that youth straight," said Betty, devoutly. "Perhaps I don't care enough about him to try. But his mother's a darling saint!—and if he breaks her heart he ought to be hung."

"She knows nothing—I believe—" said Naseby, quickly.

"Strange!" cried Betty. "I wonder if it pays to be a saint. I shall know everything about my boy when he's that age."

"Oh! will you?" said Naseby, looking at her with a mocking eye.

"Yes, sir, I shall. Your secrets are not so difficult to know, if one wants to know them. Heaven forbid, however, that I should want to know anything about any of you till Bertie is grown up! Now, please tell me everything. Who is the lady?"

"Heaven forbid I should tell you!" said Naseby, drily.

"Don't trifle any more," said Betty, laying a remonstrating hand on his arm; "they will be home from church directly."

"Well, I won't tell you any names," said Naseby, reluctantly. "Of course, it's an actress—a very small one. And, of course, she's a bad lot—and pretty."

"Why, there's no of course about it—about either of them!" said Betty, with more indignation than grammar. She also had dramatic friends, and was sensitive on the point.

Naseby protested that if he must argue the ethics of the stage before he told his tale, the tale would remain untold. Then Betty, subdued, fell into an attitude of meek listening, hands on lap. The tale when told indeed proved to be a very ordinary affair, marked out perhaps a trifle from the ruck by the facts that there was another pretender in the field with whom Ancoats had already had one scene in public, and would probably have more; that Ancoats being Ancoats, something mad and conspicuous was to be expected, which would bring the matter inevitably to his mother's ears; and that Mrs. Allison was Mrs. Allison.

"Can he marry her?" said Betty, quickly.

"Thank Heaven! no. There is a husband somewhere in Chili. So that it doesn't seem to be a question of driving Mrs. Allison out of Castle Luton. But—well, between ourselves, it would be a pity to give Ancoats so fine a chance of going to the bad, as he'll get, if this young woman lays hold of him. He mightn't recover it."

Betty sat silent a moment. All her gaiety had passed away. There was a fierceness in her blue eyes.

"And that's what we bring them up for!" she exclaimed at last—"that they may do all these ugly, stale, stupid things over again. Oh! I'm not thinking so much, of the morals!"—she turned to Naseby with a defiant look. "I am thinking of the hateful cruelty and unkindness!"

"To his mother?" said Naseby. He shrugged his shoulders.

Betty allowed herself an outburst. Her little hand trembled on her knee. Naseby did not reply. Not that he disagreed; far from it. Under his young and careless manner he was already a person of settled character, cherishing a number of strong convictions. But since it had become the fashion to talk as frankly of a matter of this kind to your married-women friends as to anybody else, he thought that the women should take it with more equanimity.

Betty, indeed, regained her composure very quickly, like a stream when the gust has passed. They fell into a keen, practical discussion of the affair. Who had influence with Ancoats? What man? Naseby shook his head. The difference in age between Ancoats and Maxwell was too great, and the men too unlike in temperament. He himself had done what he could, in vain, and Ancoats now told him nothing; for the rest, he thought Ancoats had very few friends amid his innumerable acquaintance, and such as he had, of a third-rate dramatic sort, not likely to be of much use at this moment.

"I haven't seen him take to any fellow of his own kind as much as he has taken to George Tressady these two days, since he left Cambridge. But that's no good, of course—it's too new."

The two sat side by side, pondering. Suddenly Naseby said, smiling, with a change of expression:

"This party is really quite interesting. Look there!"

Betty looked, and saw George Tressady, with his hands in his pockets, lounging along a distant path beside Marcella Maxwell.

"Well!" said Betty, "what then?"

Naseby gave his mouth a twist.

"Nothing; only it's odd. I ran across them just now—I was playing ball with that jolly little imp, Hallin. You never saw two people more absorbed. Of course he's sous le charme—we all are. Our English politics are rather rum, aren't they? They don't indulge in this amiable country-house business in a South American republic, you know. They prefer shooting."

"And you evidently think it a healthier state of things. Wait till we come to something nearer to our hearths and bosoms than Factory Acts," said Betty, with the wisdom of her kind. "All the same, Lord Fontenoy is in earnest."

"Oh yes, Fontenoy is in earnest. So, I suppose, is Tressady. So—good Heavens!—is Maxwell. I say, here comes the church party."

And from a side-door in a venerable wall, beyond which could be seen the tower of a little church, there emerged a small group of people—Mrs. Allison, Lady Cathedine, and Madeleine Penley in front, escorted by the white-haired Sir Philip; and behind, Lady Tressady, between Harding Watton and Lord Cathedine.

"Cathedine!" cried Naseby, staring at the group. "Cathedine been to church?"

"For the purpose, I suppose, of disappointing poor Laura, who might have hoped to get rid of him," said Betty, sharply. "No!—if I were Mrs. Allison I should draw the line at Lord Cathedine."

"Nobody need see any more of Cathedine than they want," said Naseby, calmly; "and, of course, he behaves himself here. Moreover, there is no doubt at all about his brains. They say Fontenoy expects to make great use of him in the Lords."

"By the way," said Betty, turning round upon him, "where are you?"

"Well, thank God! I'm not in Parliament," was Naseby's smiling reply. "So don't trouble me for opinions. I have none. Except that, speaking generally, I should like Lady Maxwell to get what she wants."

Betty threw him a sly glance, wondering if she might tease him about the news she heard of him from Marcella.

She had no time, however, to attack him, for Mrs. Allison approached.

* * * * *

"What is the matter with her?—with Madeleine?—with all of them?" thought Betty, suddenly.

For Mrs. Allison, pale and discomposed, did not return, did not apparently notice Lady Leven's greeting. She walked hastily past them, and would have gone at once into the house but that, turning her head, she perceived Lord Fontenoy hurrying towards her from the lime-walk. With an obvious effort she controlled herself, and went to meet him, leaning heavily on her silver-topped stick.

The others paused, no one having, as it seemed, anything to say. Letty poked the gravel with her parasol; Sir Philip made a telescope of his hands, and fixed it upon Maxwell, who was coming slowly across the lawn; while Lady Madeleine turned a handsome, bewildered face on Betty.

Betty took her aside to look at a flower on the house.

"What's the matter?" said Lady Leven, under her breath.

"I don't know," said the other. "Something dreadful happened on the way home. There was a girl—"

But she broke off suddenly. Ancoats had just opened and shut the garden-door, and was coming to join his guests.

"Poor dear!" thought Betty to herself, with a leap of pity. It was so evident the girl's whole nature thrilled to the approaching step. She turned her head towards Ancoats, as though against her will, her tall form drawn erect, in unconscious tension.

Ancoats's quick eyes ran over the group.

"He thinks we have been talking about him," was Betty's quick reflection, which was probably not far from the truth. For the young man's face at once assumed a lowering expression, and, walking up to Lady Tressady, whom as yet he had noticed no more than civility required, he asked whether she would like to see the "houses" and the rose-garden.

Letty, delighted by the attention, said Yes in her gayest way, and Ancoats at once led her off. He walked quickly, and their figures soon disappeared among the trees.

Madeleine Penley gazed after them. Betty, who had a miserable feeling that the girl was betraying herself to men like Harding Watton or Lord Cathedine,—a feeling which was, however, the creation of her own nervous excitement,—tried to draw her away. But Lady Madeleine did not seem to understand. She stood mechanically buttoning and unbuttoning her long gloves. "Yes, I'm coming," she said, but she did not move.

Then Betty saw that Lord Naseby had approached her; and it seemed to the observer that all the young man's vivid face was suffused with something at once soft and fierce.

"The thorn-blossom on the hill is a perfect show just now, Lady Madeleine," he said. "Come and look at it. There will be just time before lunch."

The girl looked at him. The colour rushed to her cheeks, and she walked submissively away beside him.

* * * * *

Meanwhile Letty and Ancoats pursued their way towards the greenhouses and walled gardens. Letty tripped along, hardly able to keep up with her companion's stride, but chattering fast all the time. At every turn of the view she overflowed with praise and wonder; nor could anything have been at once more enthusiastic or more impertinent than the questions with which she plied him as to his gardeners, his estate, and his affairs, in the intervals of panegyric.

Ancoats at first hardly listened to her. A perfunctory "Yes" or "No" seemed to be all that the situation demanded. Then, when he did sufficiently emerge from the tempest of his own thoughts to catch some of the things she was saying, his irritable temper rebelled at once. What had Tressady been about?—ill-bred, tiresome woman!

His manner stiffened; he stalked along in front of her, doing his bare host's duty, and warding off her conversation as much as possible; while Letty, on her side, soon felt the familiar chill and mortification creeping over her. Why, she wondered angrily, should he have asked her to walk with him if he could not be a more agreeable companion?

Towards the end of the lime-walk they came across Mrs. Allison and Lord Fontenoy. As they passed the older pair the pale mother lifted her eyes to her son with a tremulous smile.

But Ancoats made no response, nor had he any greeting for Fontenoy. He carried his companion quickly on, till they found themselves in a wilderness of walled gardens opening one into another, each, as it seemed, more miraculously ordered and more abundantly stocked than its neighbour.

"I wonder you know your way," laughed Letty. "And who can possibly consume all this?"

"I haven't an idea," said Ancoats, abruptly, as he opened the door of the tenth vinery. "I wish you'd tell me."

Letty raised her eyebrows with a little cry of protest.

"Oh! but it makes the whole place so magnificent, so complete."

"What is there magnificent in having too much?" said Ancoats, shortly. "I believe the day of these huge country places, with all their dull greenhouses and things, is done."

Much he cared, indeed, about his gardeners and his grapes! He was in the mood to feel his whole inheritance a burden round his neck. But at the same time to revile his own wealth gave him a pungent sense of playing the artist.

"Have you argued that with Lord Fontenoy?" she inquired archly.

"I should not take the trouble," he said, with careless hauteur. "Ah!"—Letty's vanity winced under his involuntary accent of relief—"I see your husband and Lady Maxwell."

Marcella and George came towards them. They were strolling along a broad flowery border, which was at the moment a blaze of paeonies of all shades, interspersed with tall pyramidal growths of honeysuckle. Marcella was loitering here and there, burying her face in the fragrance of the honeysuckle, or drawing her companion's attention in delight to the glowing clumps of paeonies Hallin hovered round them, now putting his hand confidingly into Tressady's, now tugging at his mother's dress, and now gravely wooing the friendship of a fine St. Bernard that made one of the party. George, with his hands in his pockets, walked or paused as the others chose; and it struck Letty at once that he was talking with unusual freedom and zest.

Yes, it was true, indeed, as Harding said—they had made friends. As she looked at them the first movement of a jealous temper stirred in Letty. She was angry with Lady Maxwell's beauty, and angry with George's enjoyment. It was like the great lady all over to slight the wife and annex the husband. George certainly might have taken the trouble to come and look for her on their return from church!

So, while Ancoats talked stiffly with Marcella, the bride, a few paces off, let George understand through her bantering manner that she was out of humour.

"But, dear, I had no notion you would be let out so soon," pleaded George. "That good man really can't earn his pay."

"Oh! but of course you knew it was High Church—all split up into little bits," said Letty, unappeased. "But naturally—"

She was about to add some jealous sarcasm when it was arrested by the arrival of Sir Philip Wentworth and Watton, whose figures appeared in a side-archway close to her.

"Ah! well guessed," said Sir Philip. "I thought we should find you among the paeonies. Lady Tressady, did you ever see such a show? Ancoats, is your head gardener visible on a Sunday? I ask with trembling, for there is no more magnificent member of creation. But if I could get at him, to ask him about an orchid I saw in one of your houses yesterday, I should be grateful."

"Come into the next garden, then," said Ancoats, "where the orchid-houses are. If he isn't there, we'll send for him."

"Then, Lady Tressady, you must come and see me through," said Sir Philip, gallantly. "I want to quarrel with him about a label—and you remember Dizzy's saying—'a head gardener is always opinionated'? Are you coming, Lady Maxwell?"

Marcella shook her head, smiling.

"I am afraid I hate hothouses," she said.

"My dear lady, don't pine for the life according to nature at Castle Luton!" said Sir Philip, raising a finger. "The best of hothouses, like the best of anything, demands a thrill."

Marcella shrugged her shoulders.

"I get more thrill out of the paeonies."

Sir Philip laughed, and he and Watton carried off Letty, whose vanity was once more happy in their society; while Ancoats, glad of the pretext, hurried along in front to find the great Mr. Newmarch.

* * * * *

"I believe there are some wonderful irises out in the Friar's Garden," said Marcella. "Mrs. Allison told me there was a show of them somewhere. Let me see if I can find the way. And Hallin would like the goldfish in the fountain."

Her two companions followed her gladly, and she led them through devious paths till there was a shout from Hallin, and the most poetic corner of a famous garden revealed itself. Amid the ruins of a cloister that had once formed part of the dissolved Cistercian priory on whose confiscated lands Castle Luton had arisen, a rich medley of flowers was in full and perfect bloom. Irises in every ravishing shade of purple, lilac, and gold, carpets of daffodils and narcissus, covered the ground, and ran into each corner and cranny of the old wall. Yellow banksia and white clematis climbed the crumbling shafts, or made new tracery for the empty windows, and where the ruin ended, yew hedges, adorned at top with a whole procession of birds and beasts, began. The flowery space thus enclosed was broken in the centre by an old fountain; and as one sat on a stone seat beside it, one looked through an archway, cut through the darkness of the yews, to the blue river and the hills.

The little place breathed perfume and delight. But Marcella did not, somehow, give it the attention it deserved. She sat down absently on the bench by the fountain, and presently, as George and Hallin were poking among the goldfish, she turned to her companion with the abrupt question:

"You didn't know Ancoats, I think, before this visit, did you?"

"Only as one knows the merest acquaintance. Fontenoy introduced me to him at the club."

Marcella sighed. She seemed to be arguing something with herself. At last, with a quick look towards the approaches of the garden, she said in a low voice:

"I think you must know that his friends are not happy about him?"

It so happened that Watton had found opportunity to show Tressady that morning a paragraph from one of the numerous papers that batten on the British peer, his dress, his morals, and his sport. The paragraph, without names, without even initials, contained an outline of Lord Ancoats's affairs which Harding, who knew everything of a scandalous nature, declared to be well informed. It had made George whistle; and afterwards he had watched Mrs. Allison go to church with a new interest in her proceedings.

So that when Marcella threw out her hesitating question, he said at once:

"I know what the papers are beginning to say—that is, I have seen a paragraph—"

"Oh! those newspapers!" she said in distress. "We are all afraid of some madness, and any increase of talk may hasten it. There is no one who can control him, and of late he has not even tried to conceal things."

"It is a determined face," said George. "I am afraid he will take his way. How is it that he comes to be so unlike his mother?"

"How is it that adoration and sacrifice count for so little?" said Marcella, sadly. "She has given him all the best of her life."

And she drew a rapid sketch of the youth's career and the mother's devotion.

George listened in silence. What she said showed him that in his conversations with Ancoats that young man had been talking round and about his own case a good deal! and when she paused he said drily:

"Poor Mrs. Allison! But, you know, there must be some crumples in the rose-leaves of the great."

She looked at him with a momentary astonishment.

"Why should one think of her as 'great'? Would not any mother suffer? First of all he is so changed; it is so difficult to get at him—his friends are so unlike hers—he is so wrapped up in London, so apathetic about his estate. All the religious sympathy that meant so much to her is gone. And now he threatens her with this—what shall I call it?"—her lip curled—"this entanglement. If it goes on, how shall we keep her from breaking her heart over it? Poor thing! poor mothers!"

She raised her white hand, and let it fall upon her knee with one of the free, instinctive gestures that made her beauty so expressive.

But George would not yield himself to her feeling.

"Ancoats will get through it—somehow—as other men do," he said stubbornly, "and she must get through it too—and not break her heart."

Marcella was silent. He turned towards her after a moment.

"You think that a brutal doctrine? But if you'll let me say it, life and ease and good temper are really not the brittle things women make them! Why do they put all their treasure into that one bag they call their affections? There is plenty else in life—there is indeed! It shows poverty of mind!"

He laughed, and taking up a pebble dropped it sharply among the goldfish.

"Alack!" said Marcella, caressing her child's head as he stood playing beside her. "Hallin, I can't have you kiss my hand like that. Sir George says it's poverty of mind."

"It ain't," said Hallin, promptly. But his remark had a deplorable lack of unction, for the goldfish, startled by George's pebble, were at that moment performing evolutions of the greatest interest, and his black eyes were greedily bent upon them.

Both laughed, and George let her remark alone. But his few words left on Marcella a painful impression, which renewed her compassion of the night before. This young fellow, just married, protesting against an over-exaltation of the affections!—it struck her as half tragic, half grotesque. And, of course, it was explained by the idiosyncrasies of that little person in a Paris gown now walking about somewhere with Sir Philip!

Yet, just as she had again allowed herself to think of him as someone far younger and less mature than herself, he quietly renewed the conversation, so far as it concerned Ancoats, talking with a caustic good sense, a shrewd perception, and at bottom with a good feeling, that first astonished her, and then mastered her friendship more and more. She found herself yielding him a fuller and fuller confidence, appealing to him, taking pleasure in anything that woke the humour of the sharp, long face, or that rare blink of the blue eyes that meant a leap of some responsive sympathy he could not quite conceal.

And for him it was all pleasure, though he never stopped to think of it. The lines of her slender form, as she sat with such careless dignity beside him, her lovely eyes, the turns of her head, the softening tones of her voice, the sense of an emerging bond that had in it nothing ignoble, nothing to be ashamed of, together with the child's simple liking for him, and the mere physical delight of this morning of late May—the rush and splendour of its white, thunderous clouds, its penetrating, scented air: each and all played their part in the rise of a new emotion he would not have analysed if he could.

He was particularly glad that in this fresh day of growing intimacy she had as yet talked politics or "questions" of any sort so little! It made it all the more possible to escape from, to wholly overthrow in his mind, that first hostile image of her, impressed—strange unreason on his part!—by that first meeting with her in the crowd round the injured child, and in the hospital ward. Had she started any subject of mere controversy he would have held his own as stoutly as ever. But so long as she let them lie, herself, the woman, insensibly argued for her, and wore down his earlier mood.

So long, indeed, as he forgot Maxwell's part in it all! But it was not possible to forget it long. For the wife's passion, in spite of a noble reticence, shone through her whole personality in a way that alternately touched and challenged her new friend. No; let him remember that Maxwell's ways of looking at things were none the less pestilent because she put them into words.

* * * * *

After luncheon Betty Leven found herself in a corner of the Green Drawing-room. On the other side of it Mrs. Allison and Lord Fontenoy were seated together, with Sir Philip Wentworth not far off. Lord Fontenoy was describing his week in Parliament. Betty, who knew and generally shunned him, raised her eyebrows occasionally, as she caught the animated voice, the queer laughs, and fluent expositions, which the presence of his muse was drawing from this most ungainly of worshippers. His talk, indeed, was one long invocation; and the little white-haired lady in the armchair was doing her best to play Melpomene. Her speech was very soft. But it made for battle; and Fontenoy was never so formidable as when he was fresh from Castle Luton.

Betty's thoughts, however, had once more slipped away from her immediate neighbours, and were pursuing more exciting matters,—the state of Madeleine Penley's heart and the wiles of that witch-woman in London, who must be somehow plucked like a burr from Ancoats's skirts,—when Marcella entered the room, hat in hand.

"Whither away, fair lady?" cried Betty; "come and talk to me."

"Hallin will be in the river," said Marcella, irresolute.

"If he is, Sir George will fish him out. Besides, I believe Sir George and Ancoats have gone for a walk, and Hallin with them. I heard Maxwell tell Hallin he might go."

Marcella turned an uncertain look upon Lord Fontenoy and Mrs. Allison. But directly Maxwell's wife entered the room, Maxwell's enemy had dropped his talk of political affairs, and he was now showing Sir Philip a portfolio of Mrs. Allison's sketches, with a subdued ardour that brought a kindly smile to Marcella's lip. In general, Fontenoy had neither eye nor ear for anything artistic; moreover, he spoke barbarous French, and no other European tongue; while of letters he had scarcely a tincture. But when it became a question of Mrs. Allison's accomplishments, her drawing, her embroidery, still more her admirable French and excellent Italian, the books she had read, and the poetry she knew by heart, he was all appreciation—one might almost say, all feeling. It was Cymon and Iphigenia in a modern and middle-aged key.

His mien he fashioned and his tongue he filed.

And did a blunder come, Iphigenia gently and deftly put it to rights.

"Where is Madeleine?" asked Betty, as Marcella approached her sofa.

"Walking with Lord Naseby, I think."

"What was the matter on the way from church?" asked Betty, in a low voice, raising her face to her friend.

Marcella, looked gravely down upon her.

"If you come into the garden I will tell you. Madeleine told me."

Betty, all curiosity, followed her friend through the open window to a seat in the Dutch garden outside.

"It was a terrible thing that happened," said Marcella, sitting erect, and speaking with a manner of suppressed energy that Betty knew well; "one of the things that make my blood boil when I come here. You know how she rules the village?"—She turned imperceptibly towards the distant drawing-room, where Mrs. Allison's white head was still visible. "Not only must all the cottages be beautiful, but all the people must reach a certain standard of virtue. If a man drinks, he must go; if a girl loses her character, she and her child must go. It was such a girl that threw herself in the way of the party this morning. Her mother would not part with her; so the decree went forth—the whole family must go. They say the girl has never been right in her head since the baby's birth; she raved and wept this morning, said her parents could find no work elsewhere—they must die, she and her child must die. Mrs. Allison tried to stop her, but couldn't; then she hurriedly sent the others on, and stayed behind herself—only for a minute or two; she overtook Madeleine almost immediately. Madeleine is sure she was inexorable; so am I; she always is. I once argued with her about a case of the kind—a cruel case! 'Those are the sins that make me shudder!' she said, and one could make no impression on her whatever. You see how exhausted she looks this afternoon. She will wear herself out, probably, praying and weeping over the girl."

Betty threw up her hands.

"My dear!—when she knows—"

"It may perfectly well kill her," said Marcella, steadily. Then, after a pause, Betty saw her face flush from brow to chin, and she added, in a low and passionate voice: "Nevertheless, from all tyrannies and cruelties in the name of Christ, good Lord, deliver us!"

The two lingered together for some time without speaking. Both were thinking of much the same things, but both were tired with the endless talking of a country-house Sunday, and the rest was welcome.

And presently Marcella rambled away from her friend, and spent an hour pacing by herself in a glade beside the river.

And there her mind instantly shook itself from every care but one—the yearning over her husband and his work.

Two years of labour—she caught her breath with a little sob—labour which had aged and marked the labourer; and now, was it really to be believed, that after all the toil, after so much hope and promise of success, everything was to be wrecked at last?

She gave herself once more to eager forecasts and combinations. As to individuals—she recalled Tressady's blunt warning with a smile and a wince. But it did not prevent her from falling into a reverie of which he, or someone like him, was the centre. Types, incidents, scenes, rose before her—if they could only be pressed upon, burnt into such a mind, as they had been burnt into her mind and Maxwell's! That was the whole difficulty—lack of vision, lack of realisation. Men were to have the deciding voice in this thing, who had no clear conception of how poverty and misery live, no true knowledge of this vast tragedy of labour perpetually acted, in our midst, no rebellion of heart against conditions of life for other men they themselves would die a thousand times rather than accept. She saw herself, in a kind of despair, driving such persons through streets, and into houses she knew, forcing them to look, and feel. Even now, at the last moment—

How much better she had come to know this interesting, limited being, George Tressady, during these twenty-four hours! She liked his youth, his sincerity—even the stubbornness with which he disclaimed inconvenient enthusiasms; and she was inevitably flattered by the way in which his evident prejudice against herself had broken down.

His marriage was a misfortune, a calamity! She thought of it with the instinctive repulsion of one who has never known any temptation to the small vulgarities of life. One could have nothing to say to a little being like that. But all the more reason for befriending the man!

* * * * *

An hour or two later Tressady found himself strolling home along the flowery bank of the river. It was not long since he had parted from Lady Maxwell and Hallin, and on leaving them he had turned back for a while towards the woods on the hill, on the pretext that he wanted more of a walk. Now, however, he was hurrying towards the house, that there might be time for a chat with Letty before dressing. She would think he had been away too long. But he had proposed to take her on the river after tea, and she had preferred a walk with Lord Cathedine.

Since then—He looked round him at the river and the hills. There was a flush of sunset through the air, and the blue of the river was interlaced with rosy or golden reflections from a sky piled with stormy cloud and aglow with every "visionary majesty" of light and colour. The great cloud-masses were driving in a tragic splendour through the west; and hue and form alike, throughout the wide heaven, seemed to him to breathe a marvellous harmony and poetry, to make one vibrating "word" of beauty. Had some god suddenly gifted him with new senses and new eyes? Never had he felt so much joy in Nature, such a lifting up to things awful and divine. Why? Because a beautiful woman had been walking beside him?—because he had been talking with her of things that he, at least, rarely talked of—realities of feeling, or thought, or memory, that no woman had ever shared with him before?

How had she drawn him to such openness, such indiscretions? He was half ashamed, and then forgot his discomfort in the sudden, eager glancing of the mind to the future, to the opportunities of the day just coming—for Mrs. Allison's party was to last till Whit Tuesday—to the hours and places in London where he was to meet her on those social errands of hers. What a warm, true heart! What a woman, through all her dreams and mistakes, and therefore how adorable!

* * * * *

He quickened his pace as the light failed. Presently he saw a figure coming towards him, emerging from the trees that skirted the main lawn. It was Fontenoy, and Fontenoy's supporter must needs recollect himself as quickly as possible. He had not seen much of his leader during the day. But he knew well that Fontenoy never forgot his role, and there were several points, newly arisen within the last forty-eight hours, on which he might have expected before this to be called to counsel.

But Fontenoy, when he came up with the wanderer, seemed to have no great mind for talk. He had evidently been pacing and thinking by himself, and when he was fullest of thought he was as a rule most silent and inarticulate.

"You are late; so am I," he said, as he turned back with Tressady.

George assented.

"I have been thinking out one or two points of tactics."

But instead of discussing them he sank into silence again. George let him alone, knowing his ways.

Presently he said, raising his powerful head with a jerk, "But tactics are not of such importance as they were. I think the thing is done—done!" he repeated with emphasis.

George shrugged his shoulders.

"I don't know. We may be too sanguine. It is not possible that Maxwell should be easily beaten."

Fontenoy laughed—a strange, high laugh, like a jay's, that seemed to have no relation to his massive frame, and died suddenly away.

"But we shall beat him," he said quietly; "and her, too. A well-meaning woman—but what a foolish one!"

George made no reply.

"Though I am bound to say," Fontenoy went on quickly, "that in private matters no man could be kinder and show a sounder judgment than Maxwell. And I believe Mrs. Allison feels the same with regard to her."

His look first softened, then frowned; and as he turned his eyes towards the house, George guessed what subject it was that he and Maxwell had discussed under the limes in the morning.

* * * * *

He found Letty in very good spirits, owing, as far as he could judge, to the civilities and attentions of Lord Cathedine. Moreover, she was more at ease in her surroundings, and less daunted by Mrs. Allison.

"And of course, to-morrow," she said, as she put on her diamonds, "it will be nicer still. We shall all know each other so much better."

In her good-humour she had forgotten her twinge of jealousy, and did not even inquire with whom he had been wandering so long.

But Letty was disappointed of her last day at Castle Luton. For the party broke up suddenly, and by ten o'clock on Monday morning all Mrs. Allison's guests but Lord Fontenoy and the Maxwells had left Castle Luton.

It was on this wise.

After dinner on Sunday night Ancoats, who had been particularly silent and irritable at table, suddenly proposed to show his guests the house. Accordingly, he led them through its famous rooms and corridors, turned on the electric light to show the pictures, and acted cicerone to the china and the books.

Then, suddenly it was noticed that he had somehow slipped away, and that Madeleine Penley, too, was missing. The party straggled back to the drawing-room without their host.

Ancoats, however, reappeared alone in about half an hour. He was extremely pale, and those who knew him well, and were perforce observing him at the moment, like Maxwell and Marcella, drew the conclusion that he was in a state of violent though suppressed excitement. His mother, however, strange to say, noticed nothing. But she was clearly exhausted and depressed, and she gave an early signal for the ladies' withdrawal.

The great house sank into quietness. But about an hour after Marcella and Betty had parted at Betty's door, Betty heard a quick knock, and opened it in haste.

"Mrs. Allison is ill!" said Marcella in a low, rapid voice. "I think everyone ought to go quite early to-morrow. Will you tell Frank? I am going to Lady Tressady. The gentlemen haven't come up."

Betty caught her arm. "Tell me—"

"Oh! my dear," cried Marcella, under her breath, "Ancoats and Madeleine had an explanation in his room. He told her everything—that child! She went to Mrs. Allison—he asked her to! Then the maid came for me in terror. It has been a heart-attack—she has often had them. She is rather better. But do let everybody go!" and she wrung her hands. "Maxwell and I must stay and see what can be done."

Betty flew to ring for her maid and look up trains. Lady Maxwell went on to Letty Tressady's room.

But on the way, in the half-dark passage, she came across George Tressady coming up from the smoking-room. So she gave her news of Mrs. Allison's sudden illness to him, begging him to tell his wife, and to convey their hostess's regrets and apologies for this untoward break-up of the party. It was the reappearance of an old ailment, she said, and with quiet would disappear.

George heard her with concern, and though his mind was active with conjectures, asked not a single question. Only, when she said good-night to him, he held her hand a friendly instant.

"We shall be off as early as possible, so it is goodbye. But we shall meet in town—as you suggested?"

"Please!" she said, and hurried off.

But just as he reached his own door, he turned with a long breath towards the passage where he had just seen her. It seemed that he saw her still—her white face and dress, the trouble and pity under her quiet manner, her pure sweetness and dignity. He said to himself, with a sort of pride, that he had made a friend, a friend whose sympathy, whose heart and mind, he was now to explore.

Who was to make difficulties? Letty? But already as he stood there, with his hand upon the handle of her door, his mind, in a kind of flashing dream, was already making division of his life between the woman he had married with such careless haste and this other, who at highest thought of him with a passing kindness, and at lowest regarded him as a mere pawn in the political game.

What could he win by this friendship, that would injure Letty? Nothing! absolutely nothing.

END OF VOLUME I